Bizarre Takings Cases in the United States and Australia by Silas Flint

Author:Silas Flint
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: australia, united states, acquisitions, takings, bizarre legal cases, expropriation, governmental takings, strange legal cases
Publisher: Silas Flint

Road grading cases have provided property owners many opportunities to complain against the government. One noteworthy example in 1851 was O'Connor v. Pittsburgh.[19] In 1828 the Catholic Church had built a cathedral in hilly Pittsburgh, based on city promises that the grade of adjacent streets would remain the same. However, as the years passed the city changed its mind and reduced the grades of adjacent streets by 17 feet, requiring parishioners to use ladders to attend mass. The church naturally sued, arguing that the city had rendered their property useless and thereby taken it. The court expressed sympathy, then ruled against the church stating blandly that the city was immune from suit and therefore could drop the grades of its streets with impunity.

A similarly strange Australian grading case occurred in 1878 in King v Mayor of Kew.[20] The city lowered the grade of a road then put up a fence to protect the public from a dangerous overhang that its grade change had rather insanely created. The court agreed with the landowner that the fence had devalued his property and a taking had occurred. A somewhat similar fence case in New York went the other way. In the 1838 case of Newton & Kent v. Supervisors of Oneida County,[21] expansion of a road forced the landowner to assume the cost of maintaining a portion of fence that he had never had to maintain before. The court said the landowner was not entitled to compensation because he hadn't lost any land, and the fact he lost valuable time and money maintaining a ridiculous new fence didn't count. In the 1852 New York case of Nicholson v. NY & New Haven Railroad,[22] a store owner complained when a change in a railroad grade blocked his rear door thereby preventing him from receiving new goods to restock his shelves. The railroad argued that the store owner's property had been enhanced by the presence of the railroad, but the jury didn't buy this obvious dodge and granted compensation.

Some dam taking cases (pun intended) have also been a bit on the weird side. For example, in the 1842 Tasmania case of Jacomb v Calder,[23] a tanner built a dam so he could wash his cowhides in the water. A nearby beer brewer brought suit, complaining that he could no longer use the water to make booze since it was now polluted with floating hair from cow hides. Incredibly he lost the case on the basis of "lack of pollution." In the 1847 case of Fulton v. Board of Public Works[24] a private party built a dam across a river on its property. The State of Ohio coveted the dam, then took it without compensation by declaring the river to be navigable. The court slapped the legislature on the wrist for being greedy, and required compensation.

Among the more bizarre takings cases are those involving overflights and the harm they can cause. A famous example is the 1946 case of United States v. Causby,[25] in which an Air Force base was built next to a chicken farm.

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